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On July 19, 2015, I asked myself the following question, “Where can we create a global community for those who express an interest in changing the world?” As big and futuristic of an idea as this may sound, please allow me to express how we can begin to manifest our ideal thoughts into ideal actions. Here are the two magic words, “START LOCAL.”

On Saturday May 28, 2016 at 4:18 am, I recorded a voice memo detailing my ideas and thoughts on the impact and importance of starting local. This came after sending an email over to Anand Patel. Anand happens to be the co-owner of Hidden Grounds Coffee, a local business here in New Brunswick, NJ.

In October of 2013, I interviewed Anand for behindthehustle.com. We sat down to discuss both the hardships and successes that come with opening up a new business. Since then, I have made an effort to stay informed of what’s going on at Hidden Grounds.

The email that I sent to Anand was in reference to 365 by Whole Foods, “Friends of 365” program. This is an entrepreneurial move aimed to incorporate a sense of localized, independent, and creative entrepreneurial spirit by installing third-party vendors inside of its 365 by Whole Foods stores. A few minutes after I sent this email, I had an instant epiphany…”START LOCAL.”

Why Start Local? Proximity Matters!

On January 2, 2016, I posted a video of Bryan Stevenson’s 2015 Zeitgeist Minds talk. Here he discussed the importance of being proximate to the problems in our world. “Proximity teaches us things that we cannot learn from a distance” Stevenson says. “When we get proximate to problems, we see things and hear nuances and details that we cannot see from a distance. In order to solve problems and create breakthroughs, we must get very close and inside of the problems that we intend to solve.” Starting local enables us to foster closer and more intimate relationships in the communities which we serve.

I Thought To Myself!

“With so many local businesses, companies, organizations, and schools here in the City of New Brunswick, how can I leverage my talents in an effort to add value to my local community at large?”

Naturally, my first instinct was to go to social media. I went straight to Twitter and Instagram to search for local businesses, companies, and organizations in the New Brunswick area. For some reason, I decided to check out New Brunswick’s Hyatt Hotel on Twitter.

After viewing their profile, I immediately thought to myself, “Why does the Hyatt only have 517 followers?” I was then curious to see how much of a brand presence our city government and school district had on their social media profiles as well.

Seeing these numbers were highly intriguing! Not only did I begin to see a trend, more importantly, I began to see an opportunity. According to U.S. Census data, the City of New Brunswick’s population is roughly around 57,000 residents. If this is the case, I asked myself the following question: “How might our local businesses, government agencies, and schools do a better job in regards to engaging with our community?”

Living In The City!

As a graduate of Rutgers University, a resident in the City of New Brunswick, and a substitute teacher throughout New Brunswick Public Schools, I feel as though I am extremely proximate to the diverse culture and lifestyle New Brunswick has to offer. However, along with the great potential of our city will come challenges. One immediate challenge that I have observed over the years, is a lack of awareness when it comes to business, community, education, and government initiatives. In a city with roughly around 57,000 residents, how might we do a better job in regards to reaching and engaging with our community?

The Power of Social Media!

In an age where both digital and social media presence move the world, I believe that our online platforms are the single most important places for businesses, communities, schools, and government agencies to connect and meet at scale. This leads me to my BIG ESSENTIAL question:

How might we leverage digital and social media platforms to bridge the gap between business, community culture, education, and government?

Introducing: The #WeLOVEHubCity Initiative!

The #WeLOVEHubCity initiative is a solution to our problem. This initiative is essentially the culmination of the last 5 years of my life. Since graduating from Rutgers University in May of 2011, I have worked on numerous community service initiatives as a City Year Corps member while living in Miami, FL. While in Miami, I also spent my “free” time working as a field marketing rep for Cornerstone Agency. I owe it to Cornerstone for introducing me to the world of branding, entertainment marketing, and promotion. When I returned back to New Jersey in late 2012, I began to work for New Brunswick Public Schools as a Substitute Teacher.

The combination of all of these unique experiences is ultimately what I feel enabled me to develop the #WeLOVEHubCity initiative. My love for culture, community, education, entertainment, and leadership are just a few things that I feel fuel me with the passion to pursue an initiative of this capacity. Through digital and social media curation, our mission is to bridge the gap between business, community culture, education, and government in the City of New Brunswick, NJ.

Where Might We Begin?

Through promoting the usage of the #WeLOVEHubCity hashtag to our businesses, community organizations, government agencies, and schools throughout the city, we are proactively encouraging digital conversation and dialogue on all social media platforms. In turn, this will help to endorse healthy engagement, the exchange of ideas, and the increase in brand awareness for the entire City of New Brunswick. When we curate content generated through the usage of the #WeLOVEHubCity hashtag, we will then share it across all of our @WeLOVEHubCity social media accounts.

Where Might This Lead Us?

Our @WeLOVEHubCity social media accounts will serve as “digital hubs” for the intersection between business, community culture, education, and government initiatives throughout the City of New Brunswick. Imagine a digital community center that serves as the hub of Hub City. Imagine a place where we are proud to share the accomplishments, best practices, and talents in business, community culture, education, and government. It’s a huge win for everyone involved. When we are able to pull together as a collective for the City of New Brunswick, we will also begin to economically thrive across all sectors. This will serve as an inspiration for other cities throughout the State of New Jersey and across the nation!

Collaboration + Partnership!

If you love what you hear, we would love for you to hop on board in some capacity. We understand that collaboration and partnership is essential to the healthy development and execution of ideas. We also know that we have a long way to go and thus will need the full support of the New Brunswick community at large. We would love to begin talks to discuss partnering with the following community leaders:

New Brunswick Public Schools

The City of New Brunswick

Rutgers University

Community organizations

Local businesses

Interested in saying hello? Shoot us a note at hi@welovehubcity.com. We are looking forward to hearing from you.

(Uh • Kway • Us) Aquaus Kelley is a forward-thinking Brand Strategist, Cultural Curator, and Educator. As the Founder of A Lovers Ambition Lifestyle Group, he specializes in identifying talent and creating opportunities for brand development, exposure, and growth. Aquaus has worked with companies and organizations such as Cornerstone Agency, City Year Miami, Universal Music Group, and W Hotels. He is extremely passionate about helping companies adapt to culture and building value between brands and their consumers centered around love. His ultimate mission is to use his influence to project positivity across the globe and invest in the collective future of society through the arts, education, entertainment, and leadership.

Here’s an insightful conversation on leadership as Director General of the United States Foreign Service, Arnold Chacón talks with U.S. Ambassador, Kristie Kenney about leadership getting things done, learning how to make a difference, and creating a mindful balance when it comes to developing ourselves as leaders.

When asked what qualities Kristie looks for when building and developing her teams she replies:

“I look for a range of qualities. I look for people who are innovative. I look for people who are ready to step up and make a difference. I look for people who can work well with others and also possess good interpersonal skills. However, above all…the quality that I prize the most are people who are passionate about their work.”

This was definitely a great listen. We really enjoyed this one!

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(Uh • Kway • Us) Aquaus Kelley is a forward-thinking Brand Strategist, Educator, and Music Publisher. As the Founder of A Lovers Ambition Lifestyle Group, he specializes in identifying talent and creating opportunities for brand development, exposure, and growth. Aquaus has worked with companies such as Cornerstone Agency, Universal Music Group, and W Hotels. He is extremely passionate about helping companies adapt to culture and building value between brands and their consumers. His ultimate mission is to use his influence to project positivity across the globe and invest in the collective future of society through the arts, education, entertainment, and leadership.

A few days ago I happened to stumble upon a documentary featuring Pharrell entitled, The Plastic Age. It was released on i-D magazine’s youtube channel back in April and produced by AllDAYEVERYDAY. It was a very interesting watch as it shared a lot of insight into the impact that plastic has on our planet. “In the 1950’s and 60’s, plastic was heavily marketed to consumers as a time saving device and matter of convenience” says Anna Cummins of 5 Gyres Institute. Today, it is estimated that we make 288 million tons of plastic annually. This is more than 1 BILLION TONS every 4 years! So what happens when this plastic escapes or does not make it into our waste management system? Where does all of this plastic end up?

In the Pacific Ocean exists a “Great Pacific Patch” which is approximately 1500 nautical miles from shore. It was discovered by Captain Charles Moore in 1997. This is where anything that we throw into the ocean that floats eventually ends up. Captain Paul Watson, Founder of Sea Shepherd Conservation Society mentions, “We live in the most highly educated society that has ever evolved on this planet, everybody knows…the real problem is getting everyone to care.” His estimate of the number of plastic in our oceans is around 700 million tons. It’s important for us to think about what we use and how we discard it. Think about this, when we utilize plastic that is not properly discarded, it makes it’s way into our oceans. Shortly after, it is consumed by fish. Eventually it makes it’s way back up our food chain to be consumed by us humans. “The chemicals that are in plastic make their way up the food chain and now they are in us because we’re eating those fish” says Kahi Pacarro of Sustainable Coastlines Hawaii.

So, what is the solution? Well, no one person can solve it. However, Parley for the Oceans unites partners in all categories of industries to develop new ways of doing business to protect our oceans. In an effort to address the issue of plastic in the ocean, Bionic Yarn helps to turn low-grade plastic into high-profile material. Tim Coombs, Co-Founder of Bionic Yarn shares the process of how it works. “Bionic Yarn is a yarn spinning process that takes recycled plastic bottles and turns them into a high-quality yarn and fabric. A plastic bottle is shredded into flakes, melted, extruded into fibers, spinned into yarn, and helixed into another fiber like cotton to create another surface over the recycled plastic.” “Everything has a purpose, even trash” says Tyson Toussant, Co-Founder of Bionic Yarn, “We should be accountable for everything. The basic idea is to synchronize the economy and the environment by pulling out the plastic from the ocean, keeping it on land, and making it into products for us to use.”

RAW for the Oceans by G-Star is a collection of products to make the world’s first denim from recycled ocean plastic. RAW for the Oceans by G-Star is where science, activism, and fashion intersect. “Innovation comes from a lot of different people working together” says Shubhankar Ray Global Brand Director at G-Star RAW. The idea of RAW for the Oceans by G-Star is to establish a new mindset within the fashion industry and inspire other segments of business and economy to follow these models. Captain Paul Watson sums it up best, “The strength of an eco-system is in diversity. The strength of any movement must also lie in diversity. All social revolutions in history have been carried out by passionate individuals who discover, build, and ideate. There are ways of solving these problems if we can harness our imagination to find solutions through everybody’s particular love.”

What do you love? #ALOVERSAmbition

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(Uh • Kway • Us) Aquaus Kelley is a forward-thinking Brand Strategist, Educator, and Music Publisher. As the Founder of A Lovers Ambition Lifestyle Group, he specializes in identifying talent and creating opportunities for brand development, exposure, and growth. Aquaus has worked with companies and organizations such as Cornerstone Agency, City Year Miami, Universal Music Group, and W Hotels. He is extremely passionate about helping companies adapt to culture and building value between brands and their consumers centered around love. His ultimate mission is to use his influence to project positivity across the globe and invest in the collective future of society through the arts, education, entertainment, and leadership.